Catalyst: We The Broken
by FrostFlamer
Summary: In a world where Voldemort reigns supreme, two-thirds of the Golden Trio are dead, and Hogwarts is 'The Catalyst' for everyone, is there really hope? AU, very convoluted pairings. Dark.
1. I, Pansy

_**Chapter One: Pansy**_

_Disclaimer: I am not J.K. Rowling. Therefore, I do not own Harry Potter. I refuse to repeat this disclaimer every time I post a new chapter, because, really, who reads these things anyways?_

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He sneaks downstairs, having got caught up in another brawl and needing ice for his face, when he notices that the light in the kitchen is already on.

Curiously, he peeks his head in, not expecting me to be inside, gripping my cup of hot chocolate like a lifeline.

He hastily draws his head back, but it's too late. He's been spotted.

I smile at him then, pale skin stretching over prominent cheekbones, drawing attention to the fact I look frighteningly similar to a skeleton. "Ice?" I ask, standing up, chair scraping noisily against the tile floor.

He nods, sitting down in one of the other chairs as I hands him an ice pack wrapped with a paper towel.

"What are you doing here?" he asks, almost accusingly.

I can't help but notice that he never turns his back to me, and, hiding up the flash of hurt at the realization, sneer at him. "Still don't trust the spy, do you?"

"Of course not." He looks at me with frank honesty. "If you can turn on them, you can turn on us."

I took a long sip of my drink, not looking at him for a long time. He sits down across from me, rubbing at his face wearily, leaving his glasses on the table. His sleeve slides down, and I can't help but notice a dagger concealed there, held in place by an arm holster.

It is pathetic that we have resorted to using knives and daggers and blades, especially when we hold weapons of mass destruction—and we know it.

But the Dark side isn't stupid. They know it's no use to win a war over a destroyed world. As for the Light side, well, we're fighting to save the world from them, aren't we? It's no use fighting to save a destroyed world.

And then Harry Potter looks at me, and just like he's done for the past nine weeks, four days, he quietly asks me, "Pansy Parkinson, why are you here?"

And just like I've done for the past nine weeks, four days, I say nothing.

We sit in silence until midnight.


	2. II, Pansy

_**Chapter Two: Pansy**_

Sometimes, I stop and wonder.

I wonder where my brother is, why he ran away, if he's happy.

I wonder if there really is an afterlife, a heaven, a hell—somewhere the dead go.

I wonder if my parents are in heaven. Privately, I hope they aren't. They've done nothing to deserve it.

I wonder why we can't just hurry up and win this war. Officially, we've been fighting it for only six years, just a couple months after my graduation. But I know, as do the others of my generation, Dark or Light, that this started the moment we stepped foot in that wretched school.

Hogwarts, my mind spits out.

I wish it wouldn't.

I want to remember it as it was, as it had been. When Draco and Astoria and Blaise and Tracey and Theo and even those stupid Gryffindors were happy and cheerful and so blissfully naïve about the war that raged around us even as we played Exploding Snap and Wizarding Chess.

I don't want to remember it as it had been the last time I had seen it, a battleground full of bodies, dead or too wounded to even move. I don't want to remember it as a graveyard, the heart of evil, dread, and despair. I don't want to remember it as the headquarters of the Dark Lord.

Sometimes, I wonder what would have happened if the war had ended in our last year at Hogwarts. If Potter and his band of sidekicks and loons had won against the Dark Lord.

It wasn't to be so.

Mudblood Granger—no, Muggleborn now, but old habits die hard—had given herself in place of Weasel and tortured to the brink of insanity by Bellatrix Lestrange, my mother's brother's wife. (Yes, I am related to Bellatrix Lestange, right-hand woman of the Dark Lord. But only by marriage, mind you. Only by marriage.) Mud—Muggleborn Granger died from blood loss, chained to the wall in a cell across from Weasel and Potter. Her blood stains are still there, an ugly mess of brown on the stone. Her body was given to Fenrir Greyback and his pack.

Driven mad by grief, guilt, and the loss of his beloved Mudblo—Muggleborn, Sidekick Weasel hung onto life until he killed Bellatrix and Fenrir. After their deaths, Weasel committed suicide by dragon, breaking into Gringotts in order to steal Hufflepuff's cup. (Of course, I didn't know this until later.) He died from a Bone-Shattering curse from Theodore Nott, Senior, but not before getting the cup from safety. He died with a peaceful look on his face and the word "Hermione" on his lips.

Under normal circumstances, I would have turned away, sneering,"Sickening, isn't it?" and then be done with it. But something about this made me pause.

Will someone ever be like that with me? Love me enough to die with me? Love me enough to kill for me? Scream pleas for me until I'm nothing but a cold corpse?

Before that day, I didn't believe in love. Now… well, I believe in it.

I just don't believe I'll ever have it.

After all, I'm a Slytherin. We don't deserve love.


	3. III, Percy

_**Chapter Three: Percy**_

When I arrive at Grimmauld, people are panicking.

I find Bill, who's leaning against the doorway to the sitting room, surveying the chaos with an indifferent look in his eyes.

That's the only look that's been there since Fleur died, raped and beaten to death simply because she was associated with the 'Blood-traitor Weasleys' and one-eighth veela. They stuck her head onto the gates of Hogwarts, feeding her body to Nagini. We understand the message.

Nagini will die by his hand.

"What's going on?" I ask him, nearly shouting to be heard.

He turns sharp, unforgiving eyes onto me, and I almost cringe underneath his piercing stare. Almost.

"Harry's missing." Bill finally says, turning his gaze away from me.

I pause. "He left a note, didn't he?"

He shakes his head. I sigh. Of course not.

"In that case, I know where he is." Bill gives me a look, but doesn't press further. I'm glad for it.

I go to the attic of Grimmauld, where, amid the gathering dust bunnies and scuttling silverfish, Harry sits, nestled in between two crates of imported human heads—which I should probably get rid of, now that I think about it—and surrounded by items. As I draw closer, I can tell what they are. A book. A scarf. A Chudley Cannons shirt. Something that vaguely looked like a lighter. Two rings, side by side.

I'm about two yards away when I realize exactly what they are—or more accurately, whose they were.

Hermione's book and Gryffindor scarf. Ron's shirt and Deluminator.

Their promise rings.

I want to cry. Instead, I sit and watch him touch each of them one by one, until he slips a chain off his neck, slides it through the rings, and then clasps it around his neck. He sits there, trembling with suppressed emotion, until finally, a tear slips through.

He stops to stare at it, as if surprised, but soon enough, more follow, until finally he's shaking with sobs, clutching the shirt and scarf and rocking back and forth.

I step forward, and he looks up, tear-blurred eyes registering red hair. He croaks out, "Ron?"

My heart aches, but I shake my head. "No. It's Percy."

He smiles painfully at me. "Percy. Right."

I feel guilty. I shouldn't.

Harry sniffles a little longer and then finally stands up, gathering the items carefully. He folds the clothes with more care than I've ever seen him use, and then cradles them carefully before heading downstairs.

It's unhealthy. He shouldn't hold onto their memories. They'd want him to move on.

I'm such hypocrite. After all, I do it too.

Three summers ago, I met a girl named Audrey. We were dating for a while. I was going to propose. She died. I went numb.  
I still have her favorite t-shirt in the back of my closet, and her pillow.

I wish the pain would go away.


	4. IV, Percy

**_Chapter Four: Percy_**

No one at Grimmauld dreams anymore. It's all nightmares, visions, memories, and sleepless nights.

I wake up panting, covered in sweat, tangled in the sheets. I had been running, running away from dementors and Death Eaters and trying to keep Harry alive because he was the Chosen One and if he died it would be all for naught and I could barely breathe without gasping in pain, but I kept sprinting because fuck, Ronnie and Hermione and Audrey were dead and if Harry died too their deaths would be for nothing, and oh god, he couldn't die.

I stagger out into the hall, into the bathroom, and vomit into the white porcelain bowl of the toilet.

The twins come in at one point, bags dark underneath their eyes, glamour charm worn off, and pat my back comfortingly. I don't remember much more than that, but I wake up in my own bed with a piece of paper stuck to the door.

'It didn't feel right to leave you on the floor, especially in this rotten old house. Who knows, we may have missed an enchantment and you could have been eaten by the toilet if we left you there.

~Freddie and Georgie, your beloved brothers'

I smile and laugh.

Even in the darkest of times, there is hope, love, laughter, and light.


	5. V, Blaise

**_Chapter Five: Blaise_**

When Pansy staggers in at two in the morning, no doubt exhausted and feeling like shit (she looks like it, too) I'm waiting for her, ready with a cup of that goddamn hot chocolate she's addicted to and news that she has to hear.

"The Dark Lord is on the move."

She snaps her head up, movements slower than usual but still precise and aware. "Again?"

"He's looking for Golden Boy."

She slumps onto the bar stool, facing our admittedly very Muggle kitchen. Fuck blood purists. If I want a Muggle kitchen, I will have a fucking Muggle kitchen.

I hand her the bag of marshmallows, can of whipped cream, and her cup of hot chocolate. "Thanks." She mumbles, dropping four large marshmallows into the cup and smothering them with whipped cream.

She drinks thirstily. I nurse my own drink, a bottle of orange juice—with pulp, not heavy.

"Alright. So what's this business about Potter?" she finally asks, warming her hands over the cup.

"Did Scarhead tell you he found another horcrux?"

Pansy squints, and then her eyes light up with understanding. Good. It's about fucking time. "Yeah. Hufflepuff's cup. The Dark Lord is paranoid again, isn't he?"

I nod grimly. "He's trying to find the Order's headquarters again. Warn them."

No more words are exchanged until Pansy gets up, finishing off the last bit of marshmallow and casting a cleaning charm on the cup.

"I'm going to sleep now." She says. "Thanks, Blaise."

I flash a smile at her, showing off pearly white teeth. "No problem."

As soon as she's inside her bedroom, I slump down onto one of the bar stools and wonder how the fuck I, Blaise Zabini, ended up as a spy for the goddamn Order of the Phoenix.


	6. VI, Blaise

**_Chapter Six: Blaise_**

I think it started, for me, with my mother. After she divorced my father, he was left to raise me alone in an enormous mansion filled to the brim with Dark objects. And house elves.

I was pretty much raised by them. My primary keeper, Nan, changed my little diapers. She made sure I took baths and wore appropriate clothing until I was about three, when she died. I don't remember her very well, but what I do remember is good. She cared about me, I think.

Like a mother should. I've never had anyone else do that, not in my entire life. Just Nan.

After Nan died, I was unofficially put under the care of humans. My mother's first and second marriages had bore two children—both boys—and so they took care of me. It wasn't the same as Nan. They were older siblings. But they were my family.

Marcus Flint and Adrian Pucey. Adrian was only about four years older than I was. Marcus was ten, almost seven years older. We were shoved together when our parents were having 'grown-up conversations', whether in Pucey Palace, Flint Manor, or the Zabini Estate.

When Marcus left for Hogwarts, I wanted to go with him so badly. Adrian only had two more years. I had six.

It was a long wait.

When I finally got to go to Hogwarts, it was just as I imagined. The Great Hall was magnificent, the teachers fearsome, imposing, and batty, and the Giant Squid big and friendly. (Much like Hagrid, in other words.)

Then I met Draco Malfoy. Back then, he was still a poncy little blond git, and I'll admit it—I actually cheered for Golden Boy when he turned down the ferret's offer of 'friendship.' Then of course, I was Sorted. I, being cursed with a last name starting with Z, was last, naturally.

And the looks they gave me—the Gryffindors, the Hufflepuffs, the Ravenclaws—were of disgust, hate, fear, and loathing.

Only two non-Slytherins gave me a second glance. Granger and Pothead smiled at me, even if they didn't dare clap. Sometimes I wish they did, but I know, deep in my heart, that if they did, they would have been made outcasts, Boy-Who-Lived and brightest witch of her age or not.

I remember sitting next to Marcus and Adrian, chattering on and on about pointless things—the Giant Squid, the talking hat, Albus Dumbledore's atrocious taste in robes—until we had to go to our dorms. It was wonderful.

I change my mind. It started with Hogwarts. (Of course, everything did. Hogwarts was The Catalyst for everyone.)

I was in third year when I realized it.

I had watched Granger and Scarface from a distance for a long time, so obsessively my roommates and friends began to tease me. Strange notes were scattered around my bed, like 'G likes chocolate fudge' and 'P thinks monkeys are the coolest animals ever.'

So when Poncy Git (AKA Draco Malfoy) staggered into our dorm with a red handprint on my cheeks, a sort of dazed look on his face as he sat on his bed, I wasn't overly concerned when he started complaining about 'Stupid Potter and Weasel and Mudblood' until he said, "Now I know what you see in her. Mudblood has fire. And I like feisty."

My head snapped up so quickly I got whiplash. "What?"

He smirked at me. "Does Zabini have a cwush on the wittle Mudbwood?" he cooed.

I wasn't sure what disturbed me more: the fact that Draco Malfoy was using baby-talk (with me!) or the fact that he knew that I liked Granger, which implied that he stared at me a lot.

But no one has ever guessed my biggest secret. Granger is dead and gone. We can't bring her back. So why the fuck am I still spying for the Light?

I'll tell you why.

Because I, Blaise Zabini, Prince of Slytherin, am completely and irrevocably in love with Harry Potter, Gryffindor Golden Boy.


	7. VII, Luna

**_Chapter Seven: Luna_**

When I look out the window of Grimmauld Place, I'm not at all surprised to hear Harry's voice.

"We shouldn't be doing this," he whispers to me, pulling me close. "This isn't healthy."

"No," I agree. "This isn't."

When I lean in to kiss him, it feels wrong. He's not tall enough, and his hair is too messy. I ignore that. He doesn't smell like forest and cookies and pine. I ignore that, too. I don't dare open my eyes, for fear of seeing his green ones. His eyes aren't blue. But I kiss him anyways.

I know he's doing the same for me. I know that he's ignoring the fact that I'm too short, too slender, not curvy enough. He's ignoring that I don't smell like parchment and ink and flowers. He doesn't open his eyes either, because my eyes aren't brown. He kisses me anyways.

How broken we all are, the people of this generation. How broken we all are, the survivors. How broken we all are, we the alive and standing.

I wonder, sometimes, if it would be better to die, to be dead and laying in the ground, gone from this world that has been shredded, stomped on, and spit on by war.

Then I realize that he would want me to keep fighting. He couldn't live without his beloved—he knew that, himself—but I'd be able to.

Once, to me, he admitted that he wasn't strong, that he couldn't live without her. I disagree. He's much stronger than I am. I don't think I'd be able to take my own life. Death is something I fear. So many people have died, so many I've disappointed. I'm afraid of the afterlife.

Harry pulls back, burying his face into my hair, until he's shaking with sobs.

"I miss them," he whispers to me, a lone tear dripping onto my cheek. One of my own joins it.

"I know," I whisper back. "I do too."

He collapses, legs folding up from under him. I join him on the floor, just as clumsily. "He was my best friend." Harry chokes out. "And I was in love with the girl he died to be with."

My lower lip trembles. "She was mine, you know. We weren't as close as you and he were, but she was the closest thing I had to a best friend. Ginny was alright, but it was more as if she… tolerated me. Hermione just took me, Nargles and all." I sniffle. "I was in love with the boy she sacrificed herself for."

"I kissed her once." He mutters to me, sharing a guilty secret I haven't heard before—not yet. "On the hunt for the Horcruxes. When Ron disappeared. I kissed her. I don't know why. But she was crying and still reaching for him, and I couldn't help but think that she was still the most beautiful thing in the world."

"Yule Ball." I reply. "Best evening of my life. He was lurking in the corner, staring at her and Krum, drinking the punch the twins had spiked. I started talking to him. My date—Theodore Nott—had left to talk with his friends, so I was abandoned. Padma had left Ron to talk with some Hufflepuff—Zacharias Smith, I believe—so he was alone as well. We were alone. He wasn't quite sober. We were both feeling emotional. He kissed me."

Harry makes a sort of whimpering sound, like a kicked dog, crossing his legs. I lay my head onto his lap, and he cards my hair through his fingers.

Harry and I are close. Very close. Some might even say too close. But there's nothing romantic about our relationship. We're just two very broken people, leaning on each other to stay upright in a hurricane.

Whatever love we might have for each other is purely platonic.

After all, Harry's still in love with Hermione Granger.

And I'm still in love with Ronald Weasley.


	8. VIII, Luna

**_Chapter Eight: Luna_**

I'm not sure when I realized it. That I loved him, I mean.

I think, for me, it started when I was eight, just after my mother had died. My first Catalyst.

Mrs. Weasley saw me as 'that poor girl who just lost her mother' and as such, fussed over me as much as she could. That, I remember, was the Aftermath. (I could hardly stand to stay at home, and so was more often than not at the Burrow. My father spent his time remaking the house into a chess piece. My mother loved chess.) I was one of the few who had two Catalysts. Neville had two. Harry had two. Blaise Zabini, I know, had two. Ron had two.

Ron.

Mrs. Weasley invited me often, clucking over me, making comments on how I was 'too skinny'. Ginny and Ron and I were often pushed together, but Ginny always wanted to play with her Harry Potter dolls.

Ron and I, having a great aversion to the idea, always immediately snuck off together, united in the face of a common enemy. (Ginny and her army of dolls.)

We hid up in trees, ran and raced to my home and back to the Burrow, and tried dropping some of their own concoctions on the twins when they were home.

It was absolutely brilliant.

And then he went to Hogwarts. No more running from Ginny, pranking the twins, or daring each other to climb higher up the tree.

When he came home over the summer, he didn't even really notice me, standing next to Ginny occasionally, looking at him longingly. All he would talk about was Harry Potter and Hermione Granger.

I loathed the Boy-Who-Lived and the Brains of the Golden Trio with all of my heart that summer. I left when they came to visit, too, not wanting to meet them and shatter my illusion of a cruel, perfect looking girl and an arrogant, powerful boy.

They had stolen Ron's heart. I had given Ron mine.

I wanted it back.

Then I went to Hogwarts. I chattered senselessly about Nargles and Crumple-Horned Snorkacks, and insisted that the carriages were pulled by Thestrals.

I was labeled Loony Luna Lovegood before I was even sorted.

The Ravenclaws, I know, labeled be as stupid and weak and mental before they even got to know me. They never tried to be friends with me. But then she approached me.

Hermione Granger.

And just like that, my illusions of her shattered. My second Catalyst. And it started with Hogwarts.

She tried to be my friend. I pushed her away, talking about nonsensical things even more incessantly. She couldn't take it. She stopped. Harry Potter tried. I accepted. At least he had stolen Ron's heart in a completely brotherly way. He became mine, too. A brother, I mean.

He made a good one.

Then, when Hermione was Petrified, I felt so guilty. Because somewhere, deep inside of me, I was hoping she would be. And she was.

So when she was awake again, I approached her. She pushed me away, I who had scorned her. Then the Yule Ball came, my Third Year.

She found me, in the library, redoing my paper for Transfiguration. (Cho and Marietta and their flock of friends had flushed my homework down the toilet. Myrtle got it back for me, but I didn't know how to fix it and no one from the upper years would.) Hermione cried in my shoulder, sobbing about stupid, insensitive Ronald Weasley.

I didn't say anything. I knew that if I opened my mouth, I'd confess. About how I hated her, for stealing him from me.

She started meeting me every evening. Teachers would get used to seeing me there, barefoot and surrounded with books, redoing my homework at the last minute and being helped by Hermione Granger.

Harry and Ron never noticed. They just assumed she went to the library to study. And she did. Just not for her classes. She helped me study for mine.

Then I heard, through Padma Patil, that she was going with Ronald Weasley. My heart sank. I was approached by Theodore Nott. I said yes.  
At the Ball, Ron kissed me. Then he gave me a guilty look and walked away.

My heart broke.

Yes, Hogwarts was definitely my Catalyst. But then again, wasn't it everyone's?


	9. IX, Tracy

**_Chapter Nine: Tracy_**

Slytherin House is not for the weak-willed, the stupid, the filthy, or the reckless.

It's a saying that has been drilled into every single Slytherin's heads. A first year would be able to recite it in their sleep.

It's a complete lie.

Not to speak ill of the dead, but Daphne Greengrass was so pathetic, if all the people in the world were like her, we wouldn't need an Imperius.

Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle. Need I say more?

Severus Snape is a half-blood.

We're all working (Or in Snape's case, have worked) for a psychopathic megalomaniac half-blood with daddy problems. Stupid and reckless. Double whammy.

I yawn and roll over, blearily opening my eyes. Sunshine is filtering in through the window, lighting up the room I share with Pansy and Astoria.

I leave Pansy alone. She's probably exhausted. As the only one the Order would let into their latest Headquarters, she reports to them every night. Once the Order switches locations in about three weeks, it's Draco's turn, meeting with Nymphadora Tonks. (Pansy meets with Potter himself.)

Astoria's bed is empty, perfectly made. I figured. She's either at the Ministry or whoring herself out for information again. Probably the latter. I don't like it. She's a good friend, and prostitution is a bad business. Still, it gets information, and to Astoria, that's all that really matters.

I head out to the kitchen, where Theo's already up, cracking eggs into a pan with magic. Before, we'd have house elves, but they've become unruly lately. Draco's theory is that it's because of his former elf, Dobby. I hope so. Having no house elves for us is only slightly inconvenient, but even that makes the Dark Lord go into a rage. Good. People make mistakes when they're angry.

The coffee's already done, and I flick my wand, causing eight cups to come out of the cupboard. With another flick, the coffee pours itself into the cups before returning to its position.

Theo nods at me, setting another pan for omelets on the stove. "Thanks," he mutters.

"Welcome." I nod back.

Draco comes out of the room he shares with Blaise. "Morning. Coffee?"

I float one over to him as he slumps onto one of the barstools, his hair mussed up.

"Blaise slept late last night." Draco says, jerking a thumb towards the bedrooms. "I think he stayed up late to tell Pansy."

Adrian Pucey comes through the front door, lugging two bags along. "Hey, Davis, mind if Marcus and I crash here tonight?"

He's talking to me. I reply, "You know the drill. Anything you leave behind gets burned unless one of us wants to keep it."

Adrian flashes me a grin, heading towards the third bedroom.

I get up and sit next to Draco. Speaking in a hushed voice, I ask, "Did Astoria sleep here last night?"

Draco and Theo exchange worried looks. "I don't know," Theo finally says. "I slept early."

"Same." Draco agrees. "And Pansy wouldn't know. Blaise would, though."

"Alright." Nothing further is said.

Then there's a cracking sound, and then Astoria collapses in the living room, shirt missing and miniskirt shredded. She's white as a sheet and bleeding on her back and arms and legs. It looks like she's been whipped. I know where she was last night now.

Only Lucius Malfoy would do this.

I'm on autopilot. Time to panic later, I remind myself.

"Pansy!" Theo screams. "Blaise!"

Adrian comes out of the third bedroom. "What's going on?"

His eyes fall on Astoria. "Shit!" he exclaims.

Pansy stumbles into the hall. "What?"

"Fuck!" Blaise says, running into the wall. He quickly turns around, coming into the living room. "It's Astoria!"

Pansy, as the only one with anything close to a formal training, quickly takes command. "Tracy, grab some clothes for her to wear. Blaise, can you grab a pain, strength, and two blood-replenishing potions? Theo, get the bandages. Draco, take a good look at it. Adrian—get Marcus. He got further in training than I did."

I'm back with some of Astoria's robes in record time. Theo has already returned, and Blaise stumbles in with three potions. Draco's already firing out observations, while Pansy has already done a diagnostic spell.

"Not good." She mutters. "Internal bleeding, three broken ribs, and her lung might or might not have been punctured. Fuck!"

Not good, indeed. Pansy never cusses.

Draco lets out a string of expletives, some of which I'm fairly sure is in French. I catch a word and cringe. Definitely French. "Pansy, he used a fucking knife. And her lung is punctured."

Adrian arrives with Marcus, who pushes his way towards Astoria. Draco backs away. "Damnit! If I take care of her lung, can you get the ribs?"  
Pansy nods, and they set to work. They have to have a quick discussion for the internal bleeding, before they beckon Draco over. He looks slightly queasy. That's definitely not a good sign. Pansy waves her wand, erecting a privacy curtain.

I can't see what's going on, but I can hear Astoria screaming. It's awful.

There's a crunching sound. Blaise has punched the wall. Adrian gives him a dirty look before fixing his hand and the wall. We're all tense.

The screaming stops abruptly. In away, that scares me even more. At least when she's screaming I know she's alive—but wait. There's a low sob/moan coming from the curtain. Draco and Marcus step out as Pansy helps Astoria dress in the T-shirt and sweats and brought for her. (Yes, Muggle clothing. Blaise has been a bad influence. We actually had a TV for a while before it sort of short-circuited and exploded. Ha! See? I can use Muggle terms!)

Astoria limps out from the curtain. The coffee is cold, but the omelets are fine, Theo having put them under a stasis charm. I reheat the coffee with a wave of my wand while pouring some more into empty cups.

Marcus divides the omelets among us, and Adrian helps me distribute the coffee, which everyone drinks eagerly except for Pansy, who wordlessly hands hers to Blaise. Astoria snatches it from him, mumbling, "It's not like he needs to be more hyper."

Blaise frowns at her, pausing only to redirect it towards Pansy. "Why are you so addicted to hot chocolate?" he asks, scrunching up his face.

"It's your fault." Pansy accuses him, mixing the warm milk with the cocoa powder. "Wizarding hot chocolate is disgusting sludge. But Muggle's? If heaven had a form, it would be that."

"You can't blame your addiction on me!" Blaise whines.

Pansy looks ready to shoot back a retort, but a look of agony crosses her face as she drops her cup to clutch at her left forearm. I have no doubt the look is mirrored on my face.

The Dark Lord is summoning us. We must answer his call.


	10. X, Tracy

**_Chapter Ten: Tracy_**

We all share grim looks, grabbing cloaks and masks, checking our wands and knives and weapons, mentally tightening our Occlumency shields, praying he isn't angry, for Astoria's sake as well as ours. Pansy volunteers to Side-Along Astoria, who's transfigured her Muggle clothing into something more appropriate.

With a sharp crack, they disappear. Taking that as my cue, I do as well.

It's an uncomfortable sensation, like being squeezed through a straw. Appearing just outside the gates of Hogwarts—wretched school—along with the other Death Eaters, I recognize Adrian and Marcus up ahead, the latter towering over most at just shy of seven feet.

Draco's distinctive blond hair catches my eye—he's helping Pansy with Astoria, who's limping slightly, already looking exhausted. Blaise and Theo come up from behind me, giving me a cool nod. I can't see behind their masks and long-sleeved robes, but I already know for sure that Theo is blinking rapidly, trying not to panic, and Blaise is clenching his fist, nails digging into palm until he bleeds.

I, on my part, am clearing my mind, double-checking my Occlumency shields, and putting on the perfect pureblood snob façade.

"Malfoy." I sneer at him. The Davis and Malfoy families are rivals. Must keep up the act.

"Davis." He greets me just as coolly.

Astoria and Pansy pull away, and the latter hands the former the strength and pain potions.

I watch them subtly, just to make sure Astoria's not going to collapse in a dead faint, then divert my attention to Hannah Abbott, who is wearing a skimpy, paper-thin bikini with no robes. I sneer at her, too, showing what I thought of someone whoring herself out as blatantly as that. At least Astoria did her business subtly. Inside my mind, I think about the first time I saw her at a meeting, nearly three years ago.

She was dressed far differently the first time, wearing conservative clothing, a timid, shy look on her gentle face. I was horrified, seeing her there, beyond belief, and when I shared my customary sneer with Draco, I could see the same look mirrored in his face.

What was wrong with her? How could she willingly come here, when she had a choice? Did she have any idea what my friends and I would have done, would have given up, just to have had a choice?

And then I realized she had as little choice as we did. She had a son who looked suspiciously like Longbottom, only three at most. She herself had looked desperate beyond belief. She had looked like a mother who would stop at nothing to keep her son alive.

And so Hannah Abbott, star Hufflepuff, pureblood best friend of Susan Bones, became a Death Eater whore.

Even now, she dances through the crowd, a confident, sultry smirk on her face, leaning down to reveal her cleavage, brushing her hip with theirs, tongue flicking out to lick her lips.

It's disgusting. And yet, as she and Astoria share a look, it is exactly what one of my closest friends doe every day. And Abbott doesn't have medical assistance or the assured safety of being a Death Eater.

I make a mental note to ask Pansy for some healing potions. Astoria can give them to Abbott.

Pushing the Hufflepuff out of my mind, I realize I've almost reached the castle. Alright.

There are five Muggle women, unconscious, on the floor of the Great Hall when I get there.

They're naked.

So it's going to be one of those revels.

The male Death Eaters are already leering eagerly at the very pretty women. I see Draco at the front of the crowd, as expected from the son of the Dark Lord's right hand man. There's a blonde. A brunette. An Asian. A Hispanic, I think. The last is a raven-haired woman—no, I realize, unable to stop the sharp gasp of horror. The last is a raven-haired girl, sixteen at most. In fact, none of them are older than twenty-five, if that. Most of them are around my age—twenty two, twenty three. The raven-hair is the youngest by far, that much I can tell.

Most of the men present are at least twice their age and married. (Of course, after the women bear male heirs, both partners in a marriage are allowed—expected, almost—to take on a few sex partners.)

I, as one of the women, don't participate. I'm thankful, but in some ways, I think that's worse, standing around, unable to put up a silencing charm to drown out the cries of the women and the grunts of the men. Unable to do anything else, I start to count in my head.

One… two… three… four… five… six… eighty-seven… one hundred and ninety-two… four hundred fifty-one…

I'm almost at two thousand five hundred when they stop.

The Dark Lord has stepped into the center, and as if responding to an unspoken signal, we all surge forward at once, forming a loose circle, a sea of black robes and white masks.

He flicks his wand, levitating himself, and then wandlessly casting a Sonorus on himself, calls out, "You may begin!"

Reenervates are shot at the Muggles, jolting them awake, except for the black-haired one, who is dead. Lucky her. Death is merciful. We Death Eaters, must unfortunately, are not. We can not afford to be, not under the watchful eye of the Dark Lord.

I cast a Sectumsempra, aiming at the blond one's throat—I'll learn their names later, mourning them with my friends, but now is not the time—but she is sent into a series of convulsions by the Cruciatus and my spell instead sails over her and cuts open the brunette's stomach. The Asian's hand is destroyed with a Reducto, and the Hispanic screams in pain from a bone-shattering curse.

Lucius Malfoy, who I can see on the other side, gleefully burns the brunette's skin with Incendio, then whipping her with a spell he's invented—this one's new, I notice detachedly. He must have experimented with it on Astoria.

Feeling a small stab of worry for my friend, I sneak a glance over to the sole remaining Greengrass female, but she's holding her own well, sticking to low-level pain causing hexes and jinxes. If anyone notices, they don't comment.

I turn my attention back to Draco, who's playing his part exceedingly well—my father seems to have challenged him to a show of extravagance.

I want to hurl the entire contents of my stomach onto the floor.

My father—Trent Davis—sends a blood-boiling curse at the Hispanic girl on the floor, and she shrieks and writhes in pain, nails scratching bloody trails on her skin.

Draco, face impassive and stone cold, counters, healing visible injuries on the blonde girl with a flick of his wand, and the Death Eaters hold their breath, wondering where this is going.

I am among them.

Letting a cruel smile dance on his lips, the heir to the Malfoy fortune whispers a spell under his breath, shooting a purple beam of light at the blonde. She gasps, but when she turns to look at the caster, her eyes show nothing but lust as she tries to rub herself up against him.

When that doesn't work, she throws herself on her knees, and quite loudly and plainly begs, "Please… fuck me."

When her wish isn't immediately fulfilled, she begins to touch herself, feeling and rolling her clit.

Unwillingly, I feel myself grow aroused. I clench my eyes shut, desperately thinking about things that I find completely unappealing—Draco, his father, blood, Weasel, Potter, Blaise, Dumbledore, the Dark Lord—anything.

You see, I have a secret, one that would get me killed in the most painful way possible, just because it is against society's norms.

I'm a lesbian.

More importantly, I've wanted to shag Luna Lovegood senseless since my fourth year.


	11. VI, Neville

_**Chapter Eleven: Neville**_

I'm not sure what I was expecting when I snuck into the Dark Tosser's fortress of doom (AKA the Parkinson family home) to save my Hogwarts sweetheart, but it wasn't this.

I stand rigidly under the disillusionment charm, almost painfully still, watching as Hannah Abbott, dressed in revealing—slutty, my mind supplies cruelly—clothes, bends down quickly to hug a little boy, and then, smiling reassuringly at him, stands back up and walks away. The boy, his tiny face sorrowful but understanding, begins to walk towards a room that is very obviously his and his mother's—it says 'Abbott' on the door.

It closes with a click.

Merlin, Hannah. What happened to you? Why are you doing this?

I flick a silencing spell at my shoes, not saying a word. I can do simple spells wordlessly now, and it's saved my life more times than I can count. (Which, considering we're at war, isn't saying much.)

I follow her into a dark hallway, where a dark-cloaked man smiles at her. I hate him already.

"Hello, my dear."

His gaze is full of lust and cruel superiority.

I want to strangle him with my bare hands.

"Hello, Lucius." She smiles back at him, a coy vixen, wily and sly.

Malfoy's father.

I want him to die painfully and slowly by my hand.

She nips at his earlobe. He sucks on hers. They nuzzle cheeks, but it's not romantic in any sense. It's more wild. More feral.

Die, I tell him with my eyes. I ignore the fact that he can't see me.

Hannah pulls away. "Let's continue this elsewhere. This isn't an appropriate place to do this." She tells him, eyes wide and cheeks flushed.  
He pulls her closer, growling lightly. "On the contrary, my dear. I think this is the perfect place."

I want to rip him apart and throw him off a cliff.

She concedes.

I watch.

Their clothes are quickly discarded, Hannah's ripped off, his spelled off neatly.

She's naked, and glorious.

And him? He's muscled, and tall and strong.

And he's fucking her.

She's moaning and sighing and panting, and he's growling and purring and groaning.

I can't watch this.

Then don't, a voice in my head says. Kill him now, and take her back.

I want to. Oh, Merlin, I want to.

I don't.

Instead, like the cowardly chicken I am, I run away from the corridor at a dead sprint.

Then—I stop. I backtrack to the room the little boy went into, opening the door with a simple Alohamora, stopping at the sight of the little boy playing chess (Chess!) with Theodore Nott, Junior.

Nott bolts up at the sound of the door opening, but he can't see me.

I'm fairly sure he won't attack me, but just to be safe, end my silencing charm and say, "Hey, Nott."

"Longbottom?" he asks.

He hasn't tried to curse me yet. I take that as a good sign and cancel my disillusionment charm.

The little boy gives me a look. "Uncle Theo, what's he doing here?"

"That's what I'd like to know," Nott growls.

I smile mirthlessly. "News got around to me that my childhood sweetheart was not only alive, but held captive by Death Eaters. So I sneak out of Headquarters, and find that not only is she alive, but she has a son and a boyfriend."

His eyes widen, and he shifts subtly, protectively, in front of the boy. "What did you see?"

"Don't you mean who?" I spit at him.

"Answer the question."

"Lucius Malfoy."

He becomes chalk-white.

"Oh."

"Yeah. So I figure I might as well save her son."

"What?" Nott moves towards me, knocking over the chess board. The little boy sighs and climbs onto the couch, grabbing a book—Beedle the Bard, I think—as he does so.

"You don't understand!" he hisses, grabbing my shirt, holding me close. I imagine it must look like we're about to kiss. "They're—"

He stops, looking at the little boy. I understand, and cast a Muffliato around us. He lets go of my shirt.

"They're tracking Calvin." Nott finally says. "Hannah won't leave without him. He's only alive to use as leverage against her. She's reduced to a mere plaything. A toy. A whore."

"And if I were to take him?"

He looks at me grimly. "Then she'd be raped and beaten to the brink of death. And that idiotic little Hufflepuff won't even care because her son will have gotten away."

"Why do you care?"

"What makes you think I do?"

I have no answer. I shrug.

He stares at me for a long time before replying, "Our mums are sisters."

"Hm." I change the topic, mind already totally focused on the matter at hand. I had come here to save Hannah Abbott, and Merlin be damned if I left without her. (Or a plan.) "What if I, say, transfigured a pillow or something into Calvin? Do they check up on him often?"

Nott shakes his head. "No. Astoria and I are the only two guards that have any interest in them apart from sex."

"Wouldn't Astoria have an excuse, though?" I ask curiously. Unless I had called the raven-haired Slytherin by the wrong name my entire life, I was fairly sure that Astoria Greengrass was a girl.

Nott barks out a short, choked laugh. "Tory? Tory's a whore. A prostitute. Just like Hannah."

Except Astoria has a choice.

The thought infuriates me beyond belief. Why doesn't Hannah have a choice? Why doesn't the sweet, naïve, innocent girl have a choice? Why is Greengrass a whore?

Why is the war still going on?

Why are we fighting?

Why won't Voldemort just die already?

Why did my parents have to die?

Why did Hermione and Ron leave Harry alone?

Why couldn't Fate have been merciful and killed me first?

"Why?" I whisper brokenly instead.

Nott seems to understand I'm not just talking about Greengrass and Hannah, because he just gives me a pained look, face crumpling slightly, and replies, "I wish I knew."


End file.
